Just found out about an interesting event in Wilmington, NC next month. Its called the Brits and Battleship Car Show and it'll be held on Saturday, November 5. That's just a two hour drive down I-40 from Raleigh and a lot closer for the guys in eastern NC. Anyone interested in getting a group together and driving down to the coast for the day?

Found this annoucement on the VictoriaBritish website:
WHEN: Saturday, November 5, 2005
WHERE: Wilmington, NC
WHAT: The Brits and Battleship Car Show
CONTACT INFO:
British Motor Car Club of the Cape Fear • Dave Sorensen • 910-452-1635

 

I'll be there!

 

Just a reminder, this coming Saturday, November 5, is the Brits and Battleship Car Show in Wilmington, NC. I've put a call in to Dave Sorensen, to confirm the information on the British Victoria website and will post any information he furnishes on location, times, and details of the show. We'll try to get some people from eastern NC to meet us in Wilmington and have a rotary presence at the show and see some great old sports cars.

After this past weekend's events up at VIR anyone from the RRDI or Raleigh area interested in going down to Wilmington for the day? Miata owners ought to be there in numbers to pay homage to the cars that originally sparked America's love affair with the "Sports Car" in America after WWII. Once I get more details from the British Motor Car Club of the Cape Fear I'll post it on this thread.

 

Hey guys, just heard from Dave Sorensen of the British Motor Car Club of the Cape Fear on the Car Show in Wilmington, he welcomes us down for the show. He has invited any that want to enter the show to let them know and if they get enough rotary entries might get a special classification for our cars. Their website is http://www.bmccf.org/ with links for the car show info and other interesting info about their club. Johny should bring Tiffany down, Greg should get the TII shined up, Keith should bring your vert along, Josh could show your FD, and we have several FBs that would do well representing the first gens.

The guy sounded really glad to have another sports car enthusiasts' group to join the fun. It will be at the USS North Carolina Memorial parking lot and he said they have muscle cars, other sports cars in the show as well as British cars. Sounds like a great time and some interesting cars to look at.

We can do this as the November weekend drive, we'll drive back that evening or anyone that wants to stay overnight can do that in Wilmington or go on out to Morehead City and stay on the beach.

POST HERE IF YOU INTEND TO BE THERE AND WHERE YOU'LL MEET US. ALSO IF ANYONE WANTS TO ENTER THEIR CAR IN THE SHOW TO FILL OUT A FORM FROM THEIR WEBSITE. THE WHOLE THING KICKS OFF AT 10:00 AM.

All downeast guys, you're invited to meet us in Wilmington or somewhere between Raleigh and Wilmington along I-40 to join the rotary caravan.

 

Bert, what time are you gonna be down there? I will be getting my car dyno'd Saturday at 10 am, after that I will probably cruise down.

 

It looks like we'll probably get to the Show about 10:30 or 11:00. We should be there after you run the dyno. I checked out the pics of the VIR day with the MSCCofNC and saw your car up there. Glad that you got all your auto problems fixed. How is the FB doing?

 

Yeah, everything is currently fixed (knocks on wood), I had to drop the transmission and put a new pilot bearing in the FB. It is good to go now, but I'm still gonna sell it.

 

I have maps and driving directions to the Battleship Memorial in Wilmington and will pass them out to all drivers Saturday morning. The Cracker Barrel at 7:30 AM and leaving for Wilmington at 8:30. If you're going to be late call me on my cell, 919-247-3884 or head down I-40 south toward Wilmington to catch up with the caravan.

I'll have RRDI shirts for anyone that wants to pick theirs up or who is going with us and wants to wear it down for the show. If you haven't paid yet be sure to bring the money with you.

Anyone interested in visiting the USS North Carolina should check out their website: http://www.battleshipnc.com/index.html

Prices for the ship tour are $9 adults, $8 military, and $4.50 children ages 6-11.

 

Jason, see you tomorrow after your dyno appointment.

Everyone else, tomorrow's the day, driving cars to Wilmington, meeting some new rotary owners, seeing some nice cars, spending the day with car lovers, is there a better way to spend a Saturday? The weather is predicted to be perfect all day. Show up in the moring at the Cracker Barrel in Morrisville, or pick us up on I-40 south of Rawley, or meet us at the Battleship Memorial at the car show. This is what our cars were made for.

WORD OF CAUTION: If you don't make it tomorrow, I'll feel really sorry for you, but do not, under any circumstances let your rotary know know what is going on tomorrow, once it realizes what YOU made it miss there will be payback, and with our cars payback is expensive!

 

I picked up the RRDI shirts this morning and will have them at the next RRDI for pickup and payment. Anyone going to Wilmington and wants to have their shirt to wear, post up here or the RRDI shirts thread and let me know. I won't bring the shirt if you don't request it. I'll get some pics tomorrow of our people in the new, official RRDI shirt at the drive tomorrow. Capital Promotions said that we would probably be able to get additional shirts, in lots of 12, for the same price as the initial order. So anyone that missed out on the original order will be able to get one on the next order and we won't have to order 24 to get the same deal.

Everyone going to Deals Gap definitely needs our shirts, Long Sleeve and short sleeve will be needed in the mountains.

I'll also need full payment before I can give you a shirt so have your money if you didn't prepay.

 

The car show in Wilmington was great, and the weather couldn't have been better. Thanks to Gary, Doug, Beth, Diane, for joining the caravan down. Jason showed up at the show after his dyno appointment, 230+ HP for his FC ain't bad at all and he didn't break anything!

And like all our drives the stories will come out. Found a hairline crack in the top of my FCs radiator when I got to the Cracker Barrel, the coolant had warmed up enough to cause the radiator crack to open and start seeping coolant. Luckily it was on the top of the radiator so it was easy to find. While Gary, Diane, Doug and Beth had breakfast I took the FC home and put her to bed and drove Diane's car back. Next, Doug had some fueling problems, so we had to make an unplanned stop for more gas, we pulled of I-40 at exit 343 to get gas and Eric was sitting at the Hardee's across the road from the Exxon station waiting on us. I never did figure how he knew we'd be stopping there for gas.

When we got to Wilmington and turned off I-40 on to Market St, Doug and Beth had to make a pit stop for restrooms and choclate condums. How they knew that specific convenience store had the choclate variety I don't know and didn't ask. We made it to the car show a little while later thanks to Eric leading us thru Wilmington and I couldn't beleive how many old British sports cars were entered in the show. We'd picked Nick, from Goldsboro, up on the way down I-40 and met Dave from Swansboro and Shawn from Wilmington when we pulled into the USS NC parking lot,
3 new friends:

Here are Shawns Nordic Green 8 and Dave's RX8



The first group of show cars we encountered were still in the parking lot, I call this one "All American Made, Model As and the USS NC"

 

The variety of British cars was truly awesome, there were beatifully restored examples of MGs,
here are the TCs:

The MG A was also represented:

And of course the MG Bs turned out in force:

The Trumphs were also out in large numbers but here are a few examples of the more distinquished models, The TR2:

The TR3s were really beautiful, here is one ready for a picnic:

 

The Austin Healys were magnificent and here are a few to give you some idea of their beauty, I didn't even have to ask them to smile when I took their photo,
IMG]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v284/GTUser/Brits%20Car%20Show/AustinHealeyLine.jpg[/IMG]

Here a couple of particularly beautiful sports cars:


Jaguars were well represented, I even found one my age and it won "Best of Show". Just goes to show that neither age nor miles on the chassis affect performance or looks, just reliability:


The Cooper Minis all lined up for their picture. Here is one I call Mini & Mini Me:


A couple of very distinquished Morgans were also present:


An there were representatives from the Bentley crowd. Here is "Young at Heart":

 

We had a great time yesterday and all who didn't go missed a great drive, some great story making, some beautiful cars, and meeting some new rotary owners. Remember, life is what is happening while you're at work, in school, or just sleeping. Here are a few more pictures from the trip,
As I said the T-shirts were given out to those who showed up, and here a couple of T-Shirt models:


Here we all are during the lunch break:


Here is one more shot of an outstanding MG TC in mint condition:


Here is the lone representative of AC Motors. Its actually a Cobra but the chassis used to build the Cobra was originally designed by ACE Motors, a British car company;


Diane found a car she liked, "its so cute" Its a Ripley Elf:


Here is the parting shot of the day, before we returned to Rawley, we took a group shot of our cars and Ms North Carolina: